Scarlet-X couldn’t have come at a better time, even though Canon and Arri will convince you 1080p will do, it’s a lie; rumors have it that both companies are working hard on a 4K camera. 4K represents a true Cinema grade image and it is the future of Digital Cinema. Red has done an amazing job of whipping the “industry” into shape by providing a cost effective solution for operators to own their personal gear. Having been a R1 DIT on a handful of Indi Features I can say that the Scarlet is the new MkII that does 4K and can handle abuse in a production enviroment. The amount of content that’s gonna be produced from these cameras will be revolutionary and set the new standard for tomorrow.

I have to thank everyone at Red for their support and hard efforts in designing cameras that we thought could never exist. It takes a great vision to picture a world where Ultra-Resolution is common in the entertainment industry and RED has helped us get there. Scarlets and Epics are assembled here in the Irvine CA with under 500 employees, cutting edge both in technology and manufacture techniques.

It’s been years of desire to own a Scarlet, at last that day has come…

Once my brain arrived I went on the hunt for a 5.0 Touch. My buddy Paul was at Widespread Creative Studio in Downtown Austin, Kelly happened to have a Touch Screen but no brain. Together we merged powers like an 80’s saturday morning cartoon and had a working Scarlet-X for the weekend. The weather was much like LA and the light was soft through most the shoot giving us the prime conditions with a slight frosty breeze. While prepping the camera by the curb a car stops in the middle of the road to see what we where doing. A voice pokes out of the tinty windows, “Hey is that a Red camera?” We couldn’t believe ourselves, we haven’t even started shooting!

The Shoot:

Having the same build as it’s bigger brother Epic, it allows for a “DSLR” feel but can pack a 4K Cinematic image along with high fram-rates cropped at 3K 48fps and 2k 60fps. I wanted to experiment with the Variable Speed mode to see it’s limitations since there aren’t many videos that do so. 1/3 of our video is slo-mo, majority of the clips are at 60fps; very appropriate for when your subject is moving 50mph.

To match my mental storyboard to reality I needed to suspend the camera 6-inches above the ground safely. Using a wide Prime lens (ZE 21mm) the riders needed to be 5-feet or less from the camera, as James would describe it “scary close” in order to feel like we’re riding next to Evan and Holt. Reminded me of WakeSurfing only on pavent at 40-50mph down a hill, on some runs they where so close we could carry a conversation with pointers to help improve the shot.

To keep the rig feather light we used the DC Power Adapter that was converted through the Cigarette Lighter. A GoboHead w/MafferClamp allowed us to strap the camera for ultimate protection.

UI is pretty straight forward, a whole bunch of tapping and swiping much like an iPhone. Fast and effective, the touchscreen can be locked/unlocked by leaving your finger in the top right corner until the “Lock” Icon is enabled to prevent accidental changes. I was amazed at how I could set Look presets in camera then further dial down the image in Cine-X; having RAW allows for the utmost creativity.

We finished the 2-Hour Shoot with one 64GB SSD, exposed 24 clips that summed up to 43GB of sweet sweet Scarlet footage. Chasing the light is never fun but the crew knew what we where up against so we shot non-stop. Everything happened so fast we where amazed at how many set-ups we where able to squeeze in. Feel free to click bellow at the screen shots to see them in full-res. The wide shot on the bottom is on the ZE 21mm wide open at 4K.

While Exposing I stayed between 320ASA and 640ASA. The high speed is done at F2.8_640ASA_225 Deg Shutter (60fps) & 180 Deg Shutter (48fps). All the 4K shots where at f3.2_90 Deg Shutter_320ASA. When shooting I enabled 2.39:1 Aspect Ratio frame guide which was then cropped in Cine-X along with first pass color then converted to ProRes 422. Final Color and Edit where cut on FCP 6 . I did it with a four year old laptop in two days of editing/transcoding. By only converting selective portions of a the clips it shaved loads of time rather than converting all the files.